


If I could hold you tonight

by zanzibar



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Broken, Heart, I have a lot of feelings, M/M, Matty Money Niskanen, midwesterning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-04
Updated: 2014-07-04
Packaged: 2018-02-07 09:36:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1894173
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zanzibar/pseuds/zanzibar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He doesn't talk to anyone but Paulie for 3 days.  It isn’t like he’s Jeff Carter or something.</p><p>In which James Neal's world is turned upside down and he isn't entirely sure how to react.</p>
            </blockquote>





	If I could hold you tonight

**Author's Note:**

> This is my love letter to James Neal. Warts and headshots and alleged immaturity and all.
> 
> I'd like to thank the Pittsburgh Trib-Review writers for writing mostly nice things about James Neal that made me cry and inspired this story. I'd also like to give a hefty middle-finger to the Oilers for trading my second favorite Oiler Sam Gagner and thus completely ruined my half-written story in which Sam and JT91 are married and keep accidentally wearing each other's cup rings because the Islanders and Oilers logos look similar. 
> 
> I would recommend not listening to either Bad Company's "If You Needed Somebody" [from which the title comes] or Rihanna's "I Want You to Stay" because down that road lies infinite sadness.

It’s irony. It has to be. His life is one giant, dripping fucking spoonful of irony.

They’re crowded around a table, drinking beers and catching up at a bar that is just down the road from the US Hockey Hall of Fame and actually on Hat Trick Avenue. The Friday night crowd is summer midwestern relaxed, everyone is gearing up for Matty’s epic wedding and with one phone call James’ weekend takes a pretty dramatic turn toward the worst.

It’s a surreal thing, being on the phone with Pat getting traded when all the phones on the table explode with the same news. He wanders out into the parking lot to finish talking, leaving a stunned hush in his wake. 

Weirder still is that as a group they know how to do this - almost the entirety of the Penguins-associated wedding guests this weekend were also wedding guests in Thunder Bay the last time this happened. For just one minute he’s thankful - there are almost 24-hours before Matt’s wedding. It’s not like Jordan exactly, they have a little time to get used to it before Matt and Katie’s day. And isn’t that just a kick in the face.

He briefly considers disappearing. Wandering away from it all for a little while, in the sleepy town of Eveleth, Minnesota, population not quite 4,000. But the reality is that this isn’t exactly the best time for self-reflection and he really isn't sure of much right now, but he’s sure that the guys inside love him for exactly who he is. Warts and wrist shots and suspensions and all. So instead he bucks up, finishes the phone call and wanders back into the bar where he accepts 2 shots and a beer, some manly tears, handshakes, sorry, sorry faces and Paul, pressed stoically against his right side, hand braced on his thigh, somehow steady and solid as a rock. 

And then he gets heads up, hands down, hammered.

Somehow all the guys come to an unspoken, tacit agreement that they aren't going to talk about it. They drink and play shuffleboard and drink some more. Paul somehow manages to school everyone at air hockey, culminating in a combination booty-shake-fist-pumping situation which would be embarrassing except for the part where James loves so, so much. The victory necessitates victory shots and victory dark-corner kissing, mouths hot and frantic and tinged in beer and tequila. They drink, and drink, and drink, and don’t talk about the Pittsburgh Penguins much at all.

They walk back to the hotel in the humid midwestern darkness - staggering down the middle of the street, heat wafting up from the pavement. The bar is closed down behind them, their cars all safely in the hotel parking lot, not a single soul on the street besides them.

On Saturday Matt and Katie promise to love each other forever, for better or for worse and sickness and health and concussions and dry spells and all the uncertainty that comes with being a professional athlete. James makes it through the ceremony and three quarters of the reception before he has to leave just for a minute.

His hands shake when Paulie finds him on the patio just beyond the reception tents. Paulie’s rumpled in the best way, shirt unbuttoned just a little, tie tucked in his jacket pocket, hair tousled by the magical hands of James Neal. The music from the reception is still spilling over the low rise, the ethereal glow of a thousand twinkling white lights clear against the sky.

“Dance with me,” Paul doesn’t ask what he’s doing sitting alone in an abandoned lawn chair in the darkness. He doesn’t ask how he’s doing, on this night when his world has been flipped upside down. He just holds out his hand and James can do a lot of things, but he can’t, won’t, resist Paulie like this. 

“I was really excited for sort-of-drunk, post-wedding hotel sex,” James admits, weaving their hands together as they sway to the music.

“This is OK too,” there’s a sad smile in Paul’s voice as he pulls them closer together, his heart beats steadily against James’ cheek until the song ends. Paul presses a kiss against his forehead and then against his mouth. Soft, almost chaste, like a habit and James feels like he can go back and put on a brave face again.

They skip brunch with the guys the next morning - it’s too easy to feel like it would be something he’s not ready to face, too easy to imagine it turning into goodbye. Instead, they lay buried in the clean white hotel sheets until the parking lot is quiet, wrapped together while squares of sunlight drift across the wall. Paul shoots a text to Duper and another congratulations to Nisky when they’re loading up the truck. 

They don’t talk much on the drive home. Comfortable in silence, the radio a low murmur beyond the road noise. Midway back to the cabin Paul pulls into Outing to buy groceries. James gets out and sits on the tailgate and makes 4 phone calls. 

He calls Pat to let him know they’re headed back to the cabin, he’s going to stay the week he planned, already cleared with Scary Gary and wants so much it hurts his heart a little. 

He calls Poile and says the right things, talks about being excited, uses the words “fresh start” about a hundred times. He runs over the schedule of conference calls and stuff that has to be done and doesn’t mention that he’s spending a week with his boyfriend, just that he’s spending the week on the lake but will be back in Whitby just after the 4th. 

He calls Shea Weber and leaves a message, a phone number dug from the depths of his contacts, a group text from a hundred years ago, resurrected for this opportunity. 

And he calls Ray. He’s spoken about 14 words to Jim Rutherford in his whole life. As far as he’s concerned, especially now, Ray will always be GM of the Pens for him. A father figure, someone who believed in him and someone who never hesitated to tell him where he’d gone wrong.

Ray ends the conversation when James’ voice starts to get a little thick, when Ray apologizes for this taking him away from Paul and when Ray tells him he believes in him and his skills.

Four hours after they pulled out of Eveleth they’re bumping down the back roads back to the seclusion of Horseshoe Lake, the sugar sand beaches and eternal sunsets and spotty cell reception.

He doesn't talk to anyone but Paulie for 3 days. It isn’t like he’s Jeff Carter or something. He just needs a little time, to figure out how on earth he’s leaving, how something he loves, can take him away from the other thing he loves. How he can trade black and Vegas gold for a town with Vegas in the nickname. 

Paulie’s cabin is everything James loves about him. It’s quiet and peaceful and giant overstuffed couches and big beds with fluffy pillows and down comforters and squishy rugs over hardwood floors and a fire pit and a boat and cell phone service only if you sit just perfectly at the end of the dock.

They fake it until Monday morning, doing normal cabin things, sleeping and cuddling and watching totally trashy TV during the heat of the day and wrapping up in blankets to watch the stars come out over the lake. Paul presses their lips together seriously and James says “I love you” a hundred times more than he normally does.

In the morning Paulie makes blueberry pancakes and sausage and James throws up in the tiny half bathroom just off the kitchen.

Paulie rubs his back while he heaves over the toilet and James tries to ignore the cartoony bear that holds the roll of toilet paper. 

“I don’t know what to do,” James admits, wiping his eyes and rinsing his mouth. Paul doesn’t answer, just presses his lips to James’ temple and ducks into the garage to grab a Ginger Ale and a bottle of Gatorade. Like James has fallen ill with the flu, instead of falling ill with dramatically frightening complete life status changes.

“We’ll do what’s next,” Paulie shrugs, pouring the Ginger Ale over ice and settling on the barstool again, bare feet curled around the chair legs and half empty plate still in front of him.

James’ stomach turns again and he begrudgingly takes the glass.

“What’s next is almost 600 miles,” James wipes his mouth on the back of his hand and paces the cool kitchen floor. “What’s next is different conferences, different divisions, different teammates, different houses, different beds. What’s next is Skype and text messages and snapchat and ten months apart and you falling in love with a nice normal yinzer who doesn’t knee Brad Marchand in the head and who knows how to score goals in the playoffs.” James voice climbs higher as he gains steam. “What’s next ends up with happily ever after for you and me in Nashville with Carrie Underwood and Mike Fisher and probably eternally disappointed Shea Weber. What’s next -” 

“Stop,” Paul says it sharply, his voice quietly authoritative like he’s on the ice pulling people out of Flower’s crease or away from James’ face or wading into a scrum to pull a furious Geno away from a five-minute major.

“What if I’m not,” James turns away ostensibly to put away the Gatorade.

Paul folds his hands on the bar and waits.

“What if I need you,” James presses his face against the counter until his nose disjoints against it, stretches his hands across the counter, tshirt straining against the summer bulk of his shoulders and mumbles into his forearms.

“You’ll have me,” Paul’s voice is fondly exasperated like all he was waiting for was James to say those words so he could disagree, “you don’t get rid of me this quickly,” he trails off, “not like this. Nobody gets to take this away from us James, not unless you want them too,” he pauses, like they’re back at the wedding and the priest is waiting for objections, so speak now or forever hold your peace.

“What if I’m not the The Real Deal anymore,” he comes around the corner and buries this one against Paul’s shoulder, words vibrating through his collarbone like that will make them less real, like Paulie’s worn Gophers t-shirt provides the insulation necessary against bracing insecurity.

“I don’t love The Real Deal,” Paul pushes him away but somehow holds him tight, and stands there quietly until his irritatingly Minnesotan patience forces James to meet his gaze. “I don’t love The Real Deal, or G’s Lazy, or Duper’s Nealer or the James Neal in the paper that Rossi doesn’t know or that Dejan does know or Seth has ideas about.”

“I love you,” he says it quietly, almost reverently, like it’s something he knows from the depths of his soul and the tips of his toes, like he’s Messier guaranteeing victories and Mike Lange sensing goals before the puck can find the back of the net. “I love your smile and your laugh and the way your hair is stupid first thing in the morning. I love that you always know all your brother’s linemates and stat lines even when it requires websites and apps and a fair amount of divine intervention sometimes to even figure out what state they’re in. I love that you balance fiercely overprotective older brothering with spoiling the shit out of Becca and call your mom every Wednesday afternoon. I love that you haven’t bought your parents a house but you bought your dad a garage door and that we still shot holes in the brand new one as soon as it was installed.”

Paul draws a deep breath and James ducks his head to press against his shoulder again. “I love that you hold my hand when we’re in the car and always buy the Cinnamon toothpaste even though you hate it and half the time you have to get back up out of bed to put your boxers in the hamper because you know leaving them on the bathroom floor makes me crazy. But it’s stupid and you do it anyway and just when I think I can’t possibly love you anymore you find another way to show you care.”

“I love that you play hard and go to the wall and are always the first one to scream with joy when someone scores. I love that you always stand up for the guys on the ice and that you work hard and play hard and apologize when your emotions get the best of you.” Paul pushes him back again, “but there’s a whole mountain of things I love before that J, a lifetime of love that I have for you that has nothing to do with Pittsburgh Penguins hockey or Nashville Predators hockey or any hockey at all. I love hockey because it brought me you and I hate it because it’s taking you further away. But I love you more than any of that and for reasons that have nothing to do with that.”

“Love is about compromise, and give and take, and maybe right now love is about 561 miles and learning how to be in different places. But I’m not giving up on love, on us, because you got traded. I’m not giving up on forever with you. This is a hurdle, a shitty, crappy, frustrating, upsetting hurdle. But I love you so much that I would run hurdles every day.”

Paulie pulls him close, hugs him tight enough that his ribs creak a little bit and they don’t move from the middle of the kitchen for a long, long time.

Later James will talk to the Nashville press for the first time. He’ll take questions about his playing style and why the Penguins didn’t want him anymore and what this change means for him. He’ll sit at the end of the dock and watch waterbugs skate across the surface of the lake and later the articles will mention the interference on the phone call, the shitty cell phone reception that makes Horseshoe Lake one of his favorite places in the world. 

And he’ll weave his fingers together with Paulie’s and believe that their love will find a way.


End file.
